How Will This Be?

And Mary said to the angel, “How will this be, since I am a virgin?” And the angel answered her, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy—the Son of God.” Luke 1:34-35

Ever since Windows 3.1 came out, I’ve been a “Windows guy.” The only Apple products I’ve owned were an Apple ][, an Apple iPod mini, and an iPad 1. My son, Mark, has an iPhone 4.

I’ve had computers that have run Dos, Windows 3.1, 3.11, 95, ME, XP, Vista, 7, 8, and currently Windows 10.

I don’t have anything against Apple other than their products tend to be pricier than Windows products.

That being said, I’ve been known to jest about Windows software – usually joking that the slogan for Microsoft should: “Microsoft – It Should Work!”

It should work, but it sometimes doesn’t. And then it does again. Why? I really don’t know. That’s probably because I don’t know enough about how the software works.

While it should work. I don’t know how it really works.

How does it work? I don’t know. But that doesn’t stop me from using the technology!

Mary of Nazareth asked as similar question of the angel who told her she was going to be the mother of the Messiah.

“How will this be…?”

Mary was to be the human mother of Jesus Christ. There would be no human father. God the Father would be the father of Jesus Christ.

“How will this be…?”

The angel explained it in Old Testament Tabernacle language: the power of the Most High will overshadow you. This is how the cloud that filled the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle was described.

Indeed, they would be nearly the same thing! The presence of God in the Tabernacle, and later the Temple, would be the same as Jesus Christ’s presence among people – starting with Mary.

So, while Jesus is truly a man because he has a human mother, he is also truly God because the Most High God is his Father.

Lutherans explain it this way:

“The divine and human natures in Christ are personally united. So there are not two Christs, one the Son of God and the other the Son of Man. But one and the same person is the Son of God and Son of Man” (Formula of Concord Epitome VIII 5).

While the question is “how will this be?” a better question is “Why is this to be?”

The reason is because Jesus Christ was born to be our substitute. He would take our sins away by taking our sins on himself and dying on the cross. This is why he had to be human, in order to die.

But his death would be the all-sufficient sacrifice for all the sins of all people of all time. He would have to be God in order to be able to do that.

But you have to live before you can die. And you have to be born to live. And that is what we are about to celebrate once again – the birth of Jesus Christ!